Legal Academia: Neither Retirement Nor Escape

Vol. 15No. 9

Jeff Lipshaw

Jeff Lipshaw is an associate professor at Sulfolk University Law School in Boston.

I, like most law professors you’ll meet, love my job. After all, there are no billable hours or quarterly earnings conference calls. At most, I teach four class periods a week, and, other than my committee obligations, I generally decide my own schedule. I get to teach and write about the things I care about. And, although no one becomes rich just from being a law professor, compared to professorships in most other disciplines, it pays pretty well. Yet older lawyers who are looking for an early retirement and younger lawyers who want to escape from the pressures of a nascent legal career won’t find the type of respite they are looking for in legal academia.